There's nothing comical about this manga: office building windows shatter, trains derail and cars plunge from buckling bridges. It all happens at 4:35 p.m. on a day dubbed "Tokyo's X Day."

This catastrophic scenario is depicted in a 300-page book on earthquake preparedness published by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. The book, which includes tips on how to make fly traps to rid evacuation centers of pests, begins with a weighty warning: Experts say there's a 70 percent chance of a quake directly hitting the greater Tokyo area, home to 36 million people, within the next three decades.

"It's a race between us and the earthquake. And if we don't win it we won't be able to protect the capital," said professor Satoshi Fujii of Kyoto University, a special adviser on disaster preparation to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Cabinet.